I do not have an olympic bar nor do I have a squat cage so I used the old arm bar that I have. It's also relatively my first time on squats or any big compound lift like that. So, I wanted to start slow to make sure I am getting the technique correct. I was also a little uncomfortable about loosing balance, etc with no squat cage there. I spent about 4 hours sitting at the comp just reading and watching videos on the squat and deadlift to ensure that I was doing it right. I do feel that my muscles did some work so all was not wasted on the 'puss' weight that I did, LOL. Bench was an old familiar friend but I wanted to start off slow on that one too to make sure I still had my form and technique correct. It was a little wobbly at first with the dumbbells but I got over it and by the last set they were coming out nice.

Food consumption was pretty dim except I did pretty good on water intake, 96 oz of water.Breaky - 2Xfried eggs w/2Xcheese on homemade white bread. The usual barrage of cookie & pastry tasting that I have to do.Lunch - nothinDinner - Soda, Nacho chips and that nasty nacho cheese you get from the movies, and a bag of popcorn. (went to movies)

I was horribly tired through most of my day and morning. A coffee picked me up a bit but still was worn out. I'm guessing it's a combination of not eating very well and my body adjusting to the lack of massive sugar/caffiene intake from the soda. Still getting headaches but they are fewer and less intense then when I initially stopped drinking soda.

I know, my eating habits are lacking in just about every area but I am more conscious of it now and anything is better than going to fast food 3 - 4 times a week. I am doing this by stages anyways... stop smoking - check - 3 months; severely limit soda - check - 2 weeks; start exercising - work in progress; start eating healthy - next on checklist.

05/26/2011I get a natural exercise tonight... bail hay X about 500 bails. Oh boy, it's gonna suck, lol. I guess it's great reinforcement for exercises as it has deadlifts, power cleans, bench press, and military press.

Don't be afraid to start out with body weight squats and single-leg DLs. You can progress to "goblet squats" by holding a dumbbell or a weight plate at your chest. Using light weights at first can be valuable for learning the movement patterns, and breaking in slowly.

_________________Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter.--Francis Chan

Yeah, doing the squat with minimal weight really helped a bit to understand where everything is supposed to be. I've been studying where my body placement is supposed to be on and off every day for each exercise. Some of the videos on this web site and others help out quite a bit in understanding where I am supposed to be at various times. I believe one site was clearest in regards to how deep I am supposed to go into the squat in saying 'try to teabag the floor' LOL. I did up the weight by just a little bit though. Still using the arm bar which is about 20 lb's. I'm searching for a nice olympic bar at the moment.

27 May 2011

Water intake was good, 3/4 of a gallon for both days. My food intake for Thursday was horrible, so much so, that I don't even want to talk about it. Friday was much better... poached eggs, 2 slices of french toast with a little syrup and 3 slices of bacon for breaky, lunch was two chicken sandwiches, and dinner was mashed taters, gobs of corn, baked steak & gravy.

Since I'm not very versed on the deadlift yet, and I've read that the deadlift is pretty much half of the function of the clean, I opted to practice the DL again this workout instead of the Clean. So...

Finally got my power rack today and set it up just before dinner. Nothin was gonna stop me to start this thing today so I started with my first SS workout with a full tummy and a little bit of heart burn during, lol.

SS, week 1, day 111 July, 2011Squat: | 45X5X3 | 55X5 | 65X5 | 75X5 | 85X5 | 95X5X3 |Squats felt good. My wife was watching to make sure my back was straight and the upper portion of the quads were going parallel or below. She said I did good at 95, but I felt the bar severely slowing and was getting pretty fatigued. So I feel pretty good about what my squats were set at for my first squat workout. Seems pretty low but oh well. Bench Press | 45X5X3 | 95X5 | 105X5 | 115X5 | 125X5 | 135X5 | 145X5X3 |Bench Press was easy. Of course, it's the exercise out of the three tonght that I've done the most, so I went in confident. Which as I type and think about it, confidence was probably the determining factor on all of my lifts tonight including the low #'age squat and DL. I did it until the bar was slowing and I felt that I might be deteriorating on form though. I was still hoping to go higher but I guess that's what 7 - 10 years of couch potato does to you. I used to throw up 90# dumbbells each hand with ease... Deadlift | 135X5 |Not sure if I was supposed to warm up on this one or not. I am half way through reading the Deadlift exercise on SS and remembered something Rip mentioned about keeping a uniform height to the bar to keep form good, so I just kept 45's on each end. They seemed like a pain and was a little tough to knock out the last 2 reps but my wife said I kept my back straight. I need to work on my grip though, and I need to keep the bar closer to my shins next time I think. I could also feel some strain in the very upper part of my back, so I'm not sure if the wife missed that part of the back rounding out at the last rep or if it was just in my head.

Anyways... was an excellently fun first workout. Can't wait till Wednesday but not looking forward to tomorrow's sore muscles, lol. I'll try to get video's up sometime this week or next so you guys can pick apart my form and make me start all over again. haha

Last edited by jlmoss on Tue Oct 01, 2013 1:40 am, edited 2 times in total.

Didn't get much sleep at all last night for some reason. It's not because I went to bed late. I gave myself 8 hr 30 min time frame from when I had to wake up. Was out of bed at least 6 times during the night and finally got up to go into work early 2 hours before I had the alarm set. *sigh* I've been doing pretty good on my eating though. According to the book, I am doing good on my milk and I am drinking lots of water. Eating as much protein as possible and laying off the breads, sweets, etc. I haven't actually started tracking my protien grams and other calories yet, but assume I'll get into the habit soon enough. I do have to get better on the times at which I eat. Second time in a row that I've eaten right before I do my exercises. I'm really dreading the workout tonight, my big belly is gonna get in the way even more tonight as I ate a massive steak. It was good though, seasoned with some S&P, Cayenne Pepper, seared in the pan 40 sec on each side, then in the oven at 350 for 15 min. Mmmmmmmmmmm, lol Even the kids who don't like steak too much were like Mmmmmmmm, hehe.

Oh well, not more stalling I guess... off to exercise. I'll post my results in this post later or tomorrow. One more thing before I go; my legs are massively sore from Monday. I hope it goes away a little into the exercise so I don't have to deal with it for the entire workout!

SS, week 1, day 213 July, 2011Squat | 45X5 | 55X5 | 65X5 | 80X5 | 105X5X3Squats felt awesome. Errmmm... I mean after the first excrutiating warm-up set. haha Legs feel awesome now, ready to go another round. 105 felt a little heavy, but I was sure I could have done more. I'm pretty confident that I have the form down pat too. I'll have to get the wife to record me on her camera. She couldn't tonight because she was at work making sure the bread was rising properly. Uggh, work. lol I'm not sure what I should do next exercise. Rip says to keep it nice and slow, not to make any big jumps but just a 10 lb jump was easy. I guess I should just follow the book and do 10 lb's a workout. Press | 45X5X2 | 65X5 | 85X5X3 |Press was pretty easy. I did 65 like it was nothing, so I figured another 20 lb's to find my work weight was warranted. I found it all right, cause I was stopped there. Power Clean | 45X10X2 Hang | 45X5 Full | 50X3 | 55X3X5 |I haven't a clue about this one. I will have to keep an eye out for not getting my elbows/arms up at the end of the lift. I sometimes catch them pointed down to the ground at the end. I kept the bar close to me though! My thighs have the raw skin to prove it too! I think a couple of more workouts and I'll have this exercise down pat.

Last edited by jlmoss on Tue Oct 01, 2013 1:39 am, edited 4 times in total.

Weights are getting progressively heavy and I can definately feel it. Also got a day of transporting and throwing bale's of hay for about 3 hours today. It seems I got lots of power clean style type movements. My sleep was horrible the night before. Only 2 hours of sleep, tops. The Harry Potter movie came out and had a midnight screening and of course... my 13 year old just had to see it. I got out of that place at about 3 am and went straight to work and struggled on for the rest of the morning, afternoon, and outside work of tossing those bales of hay. Good thing is, I have *two!* days to rest and try and get my required sleep in.Liquid consumption is decent, I've been drinking anywhere between 1/2 to a full gallon of milk as the program suggests along with lots of water. I slipped and drank some pepsi today. Was just really tired and needed a boost and didn't want to bother with the freshly ground coffee or water. I'll get better at that.

Haven't been able to do my exercises this week. My back has been in pain for a good bit. I went out to scout for fallen timber on our land so I could start stocking up for this coming up winter on fire wood. Got to sawing and lifting some pretty big tree trunk sections and just started getting really tired. I mean, drag feet on the ground not wanna do anything tired. So, got finished with what I was doing, got in the truck and headed home. Soon as I got out of the truck, I had a horrible pain in my lower back anytime I tried to extend, even when trying to turn in bed later that night, it really sucked. Anyways, been resting for this whole week. My back feels better now, not sure if I can do the workout this Friday. I want to, but don't want to risk it not being fully healed and be out of exercising even longer with re-injuring. Oh well, will just feel it out as I go.

Well, I got back to it today. Funny thing is, my back sort of stopped hurting as i progressed through my exercises. I'll reserve my final comments until I wake up tomorrow though, as if anything, I'm sure I would feel it after I've had time to rest. Be it pride, bull headed, or just plain stupidity, I really just couldn't bring myself to lower the weights too much.

SS, week 2, day 12 August, 2011Squat | 45X5 | 60X5 | 75X5 | 90X5 | 100X5X3 |I found myself struggling a little bit after learning to get below parallel. I almost couldn't make it back up on my last few reps. I wasn't taking advantage of the reflex thing at the bottom though as I was pausing at the bottom to ensure that my quads were below parallel. Bench Press | 45X5 | 80X5 | 110X5 | 135X5 | 155X5X3 |My left wrist hurt a little at the top. Not sure if that means I have too wide a grip or what. I dunno, I'll monitor it and try to adjust next time I do bench press.Deadlift | 45X5 | 85X5 | 135X5 | 160X5 |No problems with back pain unless I found myself with my back not extended which happened once on the first rep on the heavy lift when I was trying to pull it off the floor.

Last edited by jlmoss on Tue Oct 01, 2013 1:36 am, edited 1 time in total.

SS, week 2, day 53 August, 2011Squat | 45X5 | 60X5 | 75X5 |90X5 | 45X5 | 110X5 | 45X10 |After reviewing a bit more of the feedback reviewing my video of squats and reading a few sections of the squat in SS, I found that I was pushing my knees way too far forward. I did a lot of form practice including a lot of body weight squatting that wasn't annotated above. I did my first work set slowly making sure I wasn't putting my knees forward too much which sort of wore me out, since I would sit at the bottom of the squat for at least 5 seconds to 'feel' the position of the squat. I attempted to do my next two working sets and was just trying to get them over with I think from being tired so I caught myself going back to bad form. I stopped there and practiced a few more times with just the bar and body weight. I guess I'll just have to re-visit this Friday.Press | 45X5 | 55X5 | 65X5 | 70X5 | 90X5 |I was pretty wore out from the extra squat work, so I called it a day and will re-group next time to do power cleans. My power cleans need help with form too which I'm working on, so I didn't feel like spending another hour or two in the books and on the bar to get them done fully after spending about an hour & 15 min on the squat.

Last edited by jlmoss on Tue Oct 01, 2013 12:57 am, edited 1 time in total.

SS, week 2, day 65 August, 2011Squat | 45X5 | 55X5 | 65X5 | 75X5 | 95X5X3 |Squats felt good. I did a few more times with no weight at all pushing out my knees on the way up and making sure to try and *sit* down first on the way down. I think I got both down quite well. I'll have to verify with a recording. As soon as my wife stops being pissed at me as she's been the past entire week, I'll have her record it again. lol I went back down to 95 on work sets to work out my form which worked well. Really hate this yo-yo thing on squat progression, will be glad to get back on squat progression next week.Bench Press | 45X5 | 80X5 | 110X5 | 135X5 | 160X5X3 |Bench felt awesome. Feet pressed to the floor, shoulder blades tucked in against the bench, feet closer to my head. I put my grip closer and wrists stopped hurting. I think I'll stick with the hand position I have now.Deadlift | 45X5 | 105X5 | 155X5 | 175X5 |Deadlift was even better then bench. I was loving it. Got a little dizzy on the last work rep in a few areas, lol need to work on my breathing better and timing to breathing. I think I have my form better then my last video post. Just waiting on the wife to pick up the video recording.

Last edited by jlmoss on Tue Oct 01, 2013 12:56 am, edited 1 time in total.

No workout for me tonight. I've had about 3 broken hours of sleep since 10 am Saturday. I'll start this week on Tuesday/tomorrow when I've rested up and not all jacked up and lightheaded from just standing up from drinking so many cups of coffee and soda to keep myself alert. Maybe I can get in some practice with squats with just the bar though...

SS, week 3, day 79 August, 2011Squat | 45X5 | 55X5 | 75X5 | 85X5 | 105X5X3 |Squats are getting better and better. It feels as if I'm getting more fluid with the motion and still staying true to form with the bar lower on back, my butt making the movement back first, and my knees not so far forward of my toes. I'll have to get a video on this soon to re-check.Press | 45X5 | 55X5 | 65X5 | 75X5 | 95X5X3 |I'm starting to feel the press. Knowing that I have absolutely no shoulders at all, I'm sure this exercise is going to give me problems.Power Clean | 45X5 | 45X5 | 50X5 | 60X3X5 |Still not sure about this one. I've only done this exercise twice. I'll have to get a video of this one in a week or so to make sure I'm doing it right. I need to make some blocks at the height of the hole of some 45's so I can set the bar down on.

Good workout, I think. I think I'll add chins at the end of the next squat/press/pc workout.

Last edited by jlmoss on Tue Oct 01, 2013 12:55 am, edited 1 time in total.

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